Conjecture
by Ten-Faced
Summary: Believing Beryl can't be dead, Xenon hunts down Gelimer to save her as the Alliance wages war against the Black Mage. Surely, the perfect generoid can't have been disposed of that easily. Surely . . . surely . . . surely she's alive . . . .


The tip of his boot nudged one of the many broken piece of machinery strewn across the floor. All of them had been robots, built with mechanical hearts to protect their heartless human creator. It was never their fault for standing on the side of the enemy – they had been created to do so.

So had he, one day in the past. Only he and Roo-D had escaped out of the countless lives under Gelimer's control.

Xenon felt pity for his 'siblings' as he made his way across the remnants of their mechanical shells, but there was really only one 'sibling' in his mind as he headed towards the central laboratory.

_'If we had met under different circumstances . . . .'_

Sky-blue hair tied back neatly. Azure eyes that had once shed a single tear and crinkled with a sad, awkward smile. The emotion that had spiked within him at her resigned leave, so human and strong.

Surely she must have been human once. Surely there would have been something else under different circumstances.

Xenon laid a hand against the palm scanner, a force of habit from the days of endless tests and battles. Surprisingly, it beeped in acceptance of his pulse and lit up green. The barred door began to unlock itself.

In these circumstances he was going to rescue her from him.

The doors slid open.

"I've been waiting for you, Xenon," the crackling voice of the old man chuckled. The eccentric man in the stained lab coat looked down upon him from the platform, his wizen mouth curled in a malicious grin.

Despicable.

"I knew you'd be the perfect weapon," Gelimer sighed, pressing a button on a remote control. The platform began to lower slowly, the grinding sounds loud enough to drown out every other noise in the cavern he had set this last stand of his in. "Ever since I first laid my eyes on you in Edelstein that day, I knew that you would be the ones to make my dreams come true."

Xenon raised his hand with only the middle finger up, something Brighton had specifically told him to do after he had called 'dibs' on getting Gelimer.

There had been an argument amongst the Resistance involving the topic of just who would track Gelimer down. There had been the Battle Mage Luka, the Mechanic Aiden, all the instructors, Brighton and Claudine out for his blood and his head. The professor was a very hated man amongst the Resistance.

Xenon had won the argument, since no one could refute his claim that he had lost the most at his hands. His quest was to bring Gelimer back alive to be questioned and properly punished by the Resistance – a compromise he had to agree to in order to go after him alone.

The wrinkles on his face deepened. "Vulgar habits," he tsked just as the platform settled into the ground level with one last loud, solemn grinding sound. "Those vagabonds took you and ruined you -"

"Shut up," he told him and felt good when surprise flickered across the human's face. "Where's Beryl?"

"Of course, of course," Gelimer shook his head and walked towards him. "Beryl. I clearly warned her that she'd be disabled and be disposed of if -"

"But she was your best creation," Xenon interrupted again, not wanting to hear more of the man's voice than necessary. "You wouldn't just destroy her like that. So where is she?"

Gelimer engaged eye contact with him, initiating what he recognized to be a battle of dominance for acknowledgement as the alpha human within the general area. Otherwise called a staring contest, it was something human males did to gain an edge over the other.

Xenon could win every staring contest. He was a generoid. Unlike unmodified humans he didn't need to blink to restore moisture to his eyes.

Eventually Gelimer turned his head downwards, a sign of defeat. "Here," from his pockets he pulled out a small device with a screen.

Taking it, Xenon activated the movie player and selected the single video file.

In the small screen, Beryl was on one knee, head bowed down with her scythe behind her. Her claim was that generoids felt no emotion, but every bit and byte of her being was radiating shame.

_"I apologize, Professor Gelimer,"_ Beryl's voice was crisp and obedient as usual even when facing possible immediate deconstruction. _"I have failed to retrieve Xenon just as you have ordered."_

_"Even after my warnings?"_ Gelimer's voice crackled. _"How disappointing."_

Beryl said nothing.

_"Go in the chamber, Beryl,"_ he ordered. _"I'll punish you as I see fit."_

The clip ended.

"She's still in the chamber," the real Gelimer said. "The one right there," he added, pointing to the door Xenon recognized from the clip played just then.

The Resistance had warned him about this after his adamant resolve to hunt Gelimer down by himself. They had said that the crafty old man would try and trick him. Possibly entrap him somehow, or enrage him into making a mistake.

He wouldn't. He'd bring Beryl back and take Gelimer to be imprisoned and prosecuted just like the Resistance had told him over and over again. No one would die.

"One false move," Xenon warned, "and there'll be an energy sword sticking through your throat."

Then he fired a missile towards the door.

The steel never had a chance. One of his missiles was enough to shatter it to pieces. Gelimer softly applauded and marvelled.

Forgetting everything now when the reunion was so close, Xenon ran into the chamber. "Beryl!" he called as he stepped over the wreckage of the broken door. "Beryl! Beryl? Bery-"

Xenon stopped. And stared.

_"If we had met under different circumstances . . . ."_

There was sky blue hair on the head. The head had no body. The hair was out of her usual ponytail, but there was no mistaking her face.

_She had shed a tear and smiled as she left, he had seen her reflection in the steel of the laboratory's walls._

An arm, a leg, a hand, a foot. No torso and no heart, no support system or core. No way to put her together like a puzzle and make her function, make her _live_ again.

_Once Beryl must have been human too._

Gelimer began to laugh hysterically.

And it didn't matter that he was supposed to bring Gelimer back alive to the Resistance anymore, that the old man may have been able to restore his lost memories back to him, that he was very much wanted by all the other members of the Resistance.

Xenon didn't remember much. Him screaming in rage and fury, insane laughter cut off after a while, his energy sword humming and vibrating, missiles releasing mass destruction and lasers burning away everything, smoke and dust clouding the room, a dirty veil to hide the truth of it all.

Gelimer had never stopped laughing until he died, the old man's final revenge on his rebellious project so sweet and satisfying that it had numbed the pain of his attacks.

Sensing the smoke the fire alarms began going off, water being sprinkled in order to subdue the nonexistent fire like rain trying to wash away everything.

A terrible, heavy feeling named sorrow weighing down his heart, Xenon returned to the chamber to gather what was left of Beryl.


End file.
